Greening Steps

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Monday, December 9, 2013

I don’t know
about you, but I’ve always wondered why I spend so much time wrapping Christmas
presents so carefully with colorful wrapping paper, when all of that beautiful
paper ends up in a garbage bag a few days later.

It’s always
fun to wrap presents for family and friends, but the amount of waste is
frustrating. But, like most situations, it pays to get creative!!

Here are
some of my favorite ways to reuse wrapping paper. Something that we think is
garbage can suddenly become a valuable material with a little creativity.

Ideas for Reusing Wrapping Paper:

1)Use the paper to make textbook
covers. This could be a fun back-to-school project!!

2)Use the scraps to make a paper
collage. (This is one of my favorites).

3)Shred the leftover paper to use in gift
bags instead of tissue paper.

4)Cut small paper squares, and use them
for gift cards.

5)If there is enough paper left over,
cut out letters to use for labels on other crafts.

6)And for those of you who love to
read, you can create a beautiful bookmark with your favorite wrapping paper.

So, the next
time you see a roll of wrapping paper, think of all it can be used for after
it’s off the present!!

Monday, November 25, 2013

As Thanksgiving approaches, it’s always fun to see the different
seasonal decorations.

I’m someone
who enjoys finding creative ways to decorate, which might explain why the
picture on the right caught my attention.

I like this
idea, because the main components are aluminum and tin cans, and it just so
happens that these are in abundance during the Thanksgiving season.

Not only
does this create another use for metal cans, it provides a fun craft for the
family. And, as an added bonus, it’s not complicated!!

To prepare
the cans, you remove the labels, wash the cans, and get a color of paint that
coordinates with your decorating theme. Then, use your imagination!! You end up
with a new Thanksgiving decoration that’s made from recyclable materials!!

Fun Fact about Aluminum Cans: According to the Waste Management
Website, Americans currently discard about 2.7 million tons of aluminum each
year.

Recycling
cans can save up to 74% of the energy used to initially produce them.

And before
recycling the cans, what's a better way to reuse them than by decorating?!

Wednesday, July 24, 2013

I’m
guilty. This week, my trash can is filled with single use pouches from baby foods,
wrappers, packaging, and other random plastics.

What is it about
convenience that seems to win out over even the staunch environmentalist’s
thinking?

I’ll
say this: having a two year old who refuses to come inside to eat will make you
opt for convenience. I would rather him eat a squeezable pouch of food while
playing outside than having the battle that comes with getting him inside. Otherwise,
I get him inside and he is so mad that he will refuse to eat. Not to mention he
is the pickiest eater I have ever seen.

I
am also tired of feeding the ants and whatever else eats the mountains of food
he drops outside when I try to do the more sustainable thing and bring a bowl
of something out to him. So, excessive packaging it is, right?

One
contributing factor in this whole situation is the lack of bulk food buying
options in my town. Even at the organic grocery store, there are bins of nuts,
candy, granola, pasta, rice, and dried fruits but that’s it. Everything else
comes in a plastic wrapping of some kind and/ or plastic bag with a box. This
is especially true for things you buy to make lunches.

If
you are like us, you try to make and bring lunch to work most days. That makes
for a lot of this plastic wrapping and bags. Much of it is not recyclable, so
what else do you do?

I
don’t know about you, but I don’t have the time to make my own chips or bread
and have no idea how to make fruit snacks. Even buying fresh lunch meat from
the deli produces plastic wrapping and wax paper.

I
guess there really isn’t a solution to every issue for everyone in all parts of
the country. I suppose we can all buy what we can in bulk, recyclable
packaging, and try to get the largest packages possible to reduce this waste.

In
the meantime, I will be working on how to get a two year old to eat things that
aren’t individually packaged. Maybe tricking him into it would work?

Friday, June 28, 2013

I recently read a letter to the editor of my local paper
where the writer was outraged by the LEED certified buildings popping up in
town. The left wing liberal crazies are trying to push their weight around and
make people do things they don’t want to do.

Honestly, I am trying to understand why this person is so
upset that the town and business owners are choosing to build LEED buildings.
It saves money, energy, and water resources while the green rooftops are
creating habitat and cleaning the air.

Why are actions that are taken to help reduce our strain on
the environment considered left wing craziness? Does this mean there are no
right wing folks who care about the Earth and our strain on it? I know this is
not the case as I know many people of all kinds of political beliefs that care
for the Earth. In fact it is a growing majority of people.

It is a fact that conservation of our resources is a good
management practice; one which conservatives and liberals should be able to
relate with. Also, for those that are religious, wasn’t it a teaching of Jesus
to rid yourself of material things and not to waste anything?

However, these are not the only reasons for “Going
Green”.Sustainability makes dollars and
cents too. Ask any number of companies, big and small, about their
sustainability initiatives and most have them. From Patagonia, to Walgreens,
Wal-mart, New Balance, Kroger, Jewel-Osco, and on and on, they all have
sustainability goals and plans. They have seen first-hand how being green makes
business sense for them.

I imagine the local businesses and the town buildings that
became LEED certified have made their business case for doing so and are
achieving their goals through this. Maybe we need to stop labeling and being
outraged over so many things that are completely out of our control. Then
maybe, just maybe, we will be able to jump outside of our boxes and see all
sides.

Friday, May 24, 2013

My husband and I got the chance this week to attend the
national premier of Gasland 2, a
film about fracking (hydraulic fracturing). Since the first film five years
ago, much has happened in Illinois in this area. Leases are being signed in the
Shawnee National Forest, companies have approached my county about fracking
here, and the Illinois legislature has bills before it to ban fracking and to
allow it with a minimum amount of regulatory oversight. You can guess which
groups support each of these measures I’m sure.

But whether or not I think this should go on in the state or
the world is not what I want to talk about. It’s what led us to this point that
I am interested in exploring. The consumerism, feelings that it is your right
to use whatever resources you want without consequence, desire for cheap goods
and services, desire to live the lifestyle Americans live, etc. : all of these
things work together to lead energy companies to look for the next boom in the
energy supply. First it was steam and wood, then coal, oil, nuclear, and now
the big one is natural gas. All of these things made these companies rich at
the expense of people, ecosystems, communities, countries, and the entire
planet.

There has to be a better way and there is. It is more
difficult than I will make it sound here due mostly to politics, lobbying and
money, but renewable energy technologies have been proven to be able to readily
supply
the world’s energy needs. Between wind, solar, and hydro-power, there is
enough supply to exceed the current demands when used together. Add to those: geothermal,
wave technology, biogas, bio-fuels, and others and you have a diverse and
capable range of energy sources.

So why not? Why not build up the energy grid over the next 5
years and develop these resources and change things over? A lot depends on us.
How we consume affects more than how much garbage we make. Our lives are
connected to more than our little bubble and every seemingly insignificant
decision can have a butterfly effect to many other things including the energy
booms and busts.

I know this is a heavy topic for a Friday but someone has to
say it right? We have made many strides toward good environmental stewardship
since the first Earth Day and there is no reason to stop now.

Thursday, May 9, 2013

Since
Mother’s Day is coming up on Sunday, I thought it appropriate to address the
common gifts for Mother’s Day and possible alternatives that are more Earth
Friendly.

First
– a bouquet of flowers. While lovely, these flowers are cut and will only last
a few days to a week. Instead, get flower bulbs or a perennial flower planted
in a pot that mom can transplant in the yard. This is the gift that keeps on
giving year after year with sweet smelling aromas just like those you smell
when mom bakes your favorite sweets. As an added bonus, these flowers will take
in CO2 and release Oxygen!

How
about Jewelry? Lots of moms get Jewelry for Mother’s Day but there are more
sustainable and conflict free jewelry options out there. Like making mom
jewelry from seashells and beads like is suggested here on Earth911.com.
Or, there are companies like Brilliant
Earth who sell sustainably harvested and conflict free diamonds and
everything to go with them.

Of course there are always the hand-made coupons for mom to
use that say things like: 1 hour of alone time, free week of Daddy and kids
making dinner, mom’s choice movie night, 1 free breakfast in bed, 1 night out
with mom’s girlfriends, etc. Pick out what your mom likes and start crafting
these great coupons.

Friday, April 26, 2013

As we do many a Sunday morning, my husband, son and I walked
to the local coffee shop. It is only 4 blocks away and we enjoy walking by the
community garden and through downtown.

However, this past Sunday, the very Eve of Earth Day, I was
troubled by what I saw.

Litter. Everywhere. In the streets, in the grassy right of
way, in yards, on steps up to a porch, just anywhere you looked, there it was.

We generally will pick up cans or bottles on our walk back
and had more than our bag could handle. And we didn’t even come close to
getting 25% of it. I realize trash accumulates over the winter when people
aren’t out and about to pick it up, but this seemed exceptional. Have people
forgotten the proper place to put trash and recyclables? Or could it be the
ever growing population of folks who throw their trash out at the curb loose or
worse yet, out their car windows that are contributing to this mess?

I do live in a trying neighborhood, I’ll give you that.
However, I see a lot of litter everywhere. Suburbia is not exempt from this.
However, those people in suburbia seem to be doing a much better job at keeping
their streets and lawns free of litter. The first nice day comes and you see them
out in droves, cleaning up their yards.

Is it maybe that many of the people who live in my
neighborhood are renters and therefore don’t care what the property and
neighborhood looks like? Possible. Yet, where are the owners or management
companies of these properties? Why don’t they care enough to clean it up and
fine their residents for their disrespect of the property?

These are all things I will probably never know the answers
to but certainly will keep searching. In the meantime, I guess we need to start
bringing a few bags with us every time we leave the house. That’s our baby step
toward a greener city center. What’s yours?